Grace for the Race

With a myriad of bad news all around us—from the threat of terrorist attacks to the persecuted church; from an economy that has yet to fully recover to rumors of a ghastly epidemic which has reached our shores—it is easy to feel a sense of despair. Yet the believer is still to have hope, even in the face of hopelessness. Why? Because we hope our hope is not in One who rose from depression, disease, disadvantage, or even despair; rather, our hope is in the One who rose from the dead.

Is there anything more hopeless than death? I can’t think of anything more devastating than . . .

• The death of our comfort
• The death of our desires
• The death of our plans
• The death of our promises
• The death of our career
• The death of our dreams

Yet even when we seem to be facing the death of the life we hoped to be living, we can still have a joyful, expectant hope, because the One we hope in rose from the dead! And just as Jesus rose from the dead and lives forevermore, all those who have placed their trust in His atoning work on their behalf shall rise from all the death they have experienced in their lives. Our comfort shall rise from the dead. Our desires shall rise from the dead. Our plans shall rise from the dead. Our promises shall rise from the dead. Our career shall rise from the dead. Our dreams shall rise from the dead. And as good as all that is, there is something even better: we shall rise bodily from the dead on that great day when Jesus returns to finish what He started.

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25-26)

Is there any area in your life where you find some kind of “death” knocking at your door? Remember, Jesus is bigger than any problem you are currently facing and He has a Word that will guide you through every storm. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the resurrection and the life. He and He alone takes what is dead and brings to it life. And that includes every set of circumstances that may seem utterly hopeless to you. In Him you always have hope!

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

If you visit this blog regularly, you may remember the phrase “stinking thinking,” which I use from time to time. We all understand that negative thoughts often become a self-fulfilling prophecy and how important it is to pursue a positive mental attitude.

Yet the Bible makes it clear that the mature Christian must move past positive thinking and into the biblical process of the renewing of the mind:

I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. (Romans 12:1-2)

The apostle Paul is teaching us that renewing the mind is more than mere positive thinking. It is the dismantling of the fallible, hollow, and deceptive philosophies of this world and replacing them with the inspired, inerrant, infallible truths of God’s Holy Word.

The key that unlocks the door in this renewing process is found in the Word of God. As I have said before, the book you don’t read won’t help you! Reading and meditating in the Word of God is critical in the mind-renewing process. Take a look at the following passages, which record the words of Christ:

• He answered, “Haven’t you read . . .” (Matthew 12:3)

• “Haven’t you read in the Law . . .” (Matthew 12:5)

• “Haven’t you read,” he replied . . . (Matthew 19:4)

• “Yes,” replied Jesus, “have you never read . . .” (Matthew 21:16)

• Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures . . .”(Matthew 21:42)

  “About the resurrection—have you not read what God said to you . . . ?” (Matthew 22:31)

Six times in the Gospel of Matthew we find Jesus asking people “Have you not read . . . ?” Jesus is asking us that very same question today. God gave us His Word so that we would read it, not leave it on the bookshelf. Jesus’ consistent quoting of the Scriptures makes it clear that the Bible is to form and guide our thoughts and actions. Jesus read the Scriptures; He meditated on them; He marinated in them. And this is how we are to live our lives as followers of Christ! The more time we spend in the Word of God, the more the Word of God will be in us.

We must remember a few warnings from the prophets. Hosea 4:6 declares that “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge” and Jeremiah 2:12 laments, “My people have forsaken me, the spring of living water.” When we neglect these living waters and do not drink from the fount of every blessing that is the Word of God, we do so to our own detriment—even our own destruction.

A positive mental attitude is a good thing to have, but it must be rooted in a mind that is being renewed. It’s the difference between behavior modification and heart transformation. One can get you through the day, but the other will get you through a lifetime. The choice is always ours to make; so let it never be said of us, “Have you not read . . . ?”

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

Far too often I don’t remember where I put my car keys; I’m not sure how much time I have wasted over the years looking for them. But now my beloved Kim has come up with a solution: she put hooks on the wall by the front door on which to hang the keys when I come home. Now I just need to remember to do it! A poor memory has not proved profitable over the years when it comes to my car keys.

Today however, I want to encourage you with a word from our Lord, which tells us when a poor memory is profitable:

I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.  (Philippians 3:12b-14)

When the apostle Paul speaks of “forgetting what is behind,” he is talking about his painful past as a persecutor of the early Christian church. Paul knew that in order to make forward progress in the direction of accomplishing God’s purpose for his life, he would have to get past his painful past. If Paul had let himself get bogged down with dwelling on his past sins, he would never have been able to pursue God’s purpose in his life.

And the same is true for you! Listen, we all have pain in our past. We are all broken and all of us have a “history” littered with shattered dreams, broken promises, and unmet goals. Some, like Paul, once lived lives of open rebellion against God. But the key is to learn from the past and not live in the past. As I’ve told our congregation, falling is not failing unless you fail to get up again! And that is why Paul said that in order to press on toward the goal, he had to forget the past. This is when a poor memory is profitable!

So what past do you need to get past? Is there anything keeping you from pressing on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called you—personally . . . professionally . . . relationally? Paul knew that when Jesus forgives, He also forgets. The slate is not just clean; it has been broken, never again to be used by your Abba Father to keep score.

Jerry Bridges illustrates this need for forgetfulness beautifully in his marvelous book, The Gospel for Real Life. He quotes Micah 7:19, in which the prophet assures us that the Lord “will again have compassion on us; [He] will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea.” Bridges observes that, “Instead of living in the sunshine of God’s forgiveness through Christ, we tend to live under an overcast sky of guilt most of the time.” The antidote is to recall that God has forcibly hurled our sins into the depths of the sea, never to be seen again. And then, as Corrie Ten Boom said, “God put up a sign saying, ‘No fishing allowed.’”

Forget the failures and disappointments of the past; God has! We all must leave the past in the past and get on with living in the present, knowing we are progressing into our promised future. And this is when a poor memory is most profitable.

And if you are anything like me, do what my Kim did for me: put a key hook by the door for your car keys and your sunglasses. As I advance into this new habit, I am forgetting about all the times I lost my keys in the past!

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

We have a powerful word of encouragement today from the prophet Ezekiel, who was placed in the middle of the Valley of Dry Bones:

The hand of the LORD was upon me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the LORD and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. He asked me, “Son of man, can these bones live?” I said, “O Sovereign LORD, you alone know.” Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD! This is what the Sovereign LORD says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life. I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the LORD.'” (Ezekiel 37:1-6)

Let me ask you a question: Is there anything with less life in it than dry bones? The corpses Ezekiel saw had lain in the valley for so long that they were no longer recognizable as skeletons; all that remained were bones scattered across the floor of the valley. And they weren’t just dry; Scripture is careful to point out that they were “very dry.” There was no life in them whatsoever!

Yet God said He would make these dry bones stand on their feet and bring them back to life. And that is exactly what happened!

As I was prophesying, there was a noise, a rattling sound, and the bones came together, bone to bone. I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them, but there was no breath in them. Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to it, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe into these slain, that they may live.'” So I prophesied as he commanded me, and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet — a vast army.(Ezekiel 37:7-10)

This is the picture of every human being—children of Adam by descent and by nature. We are all very much like these very dry bones scattered over the face of the earth, utterly dead in trespass and sins . . . until Jesus shows up. Jesus breathes the grace of the Gospel into our dead, dry bones and we are raised to walk in the newness of life. It has been well said that Jesus Christ did not die on the Cross to make sick men well; he died so that dead men might live.

But there is more! After God has brought life into our dead bones and covered us with the righteousness of Christ, He begins to knit us together to each other. To be sure, we are saved individually, but we are saved to community. God begins to attach one believer to another as He builds His church—one body with many members. He attaches the rich with the poor. He attaches the successful with the unsuccessful. He attaches the educated with the uneducated. He attaches the attractive with the unattractive. This does not happen with the people of the world; unsaved people segregate themselves in every area of life. Only in the church does this knitting together take place.

When we realize what we were before Jesus showed up—dry, lifeless bones—we break down the barriers that divide us and come together for something bigger than the life we are living. We begin living for the One who gave us life and we begin living it together as one family of faith.

The grace of the Gospel begins to transform us. The dry bones of sinful pride are drenched with the dew of heavenly humility. The dry bones of self-protection are soaked with the shower of self-sacrifice. And the dry bones of expanding our own little kingdom are drowned in the ocean of His omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence as we begin expanding the Kingdom of God for His glory and the good of all others.

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

Now that’s an odd title, isn’t it? What do you think of when you read the word surrender? I’m quite sure “strength” is not what comes to your mind! Most people think of someone who has been defeated, waving a white flag and giving up. They might well picture someone who has lost all of his strength, weakened to the point where he simply cannot go on.

What a word of encouragement I have for you today! The founder of the Salvation Army, William Booth, once said, “The greatness of a man’s power is in the measure of his surrender.” Notice what he did not say. He did not say that the greatness of a man’s power is in the measure of his . . .

• Status
• Superiority
• Salary
• Success
• Smarts
• Schemes
• Significance

The life of Christ is the perfect example of this truth in action. Never has there been a life more fully surrendered to the will of God. And never has the greatness of a man’s power been more evident than in the surrendered life of Christ. Hear once again His prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane:

“Abba”, Father,” he said, “everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.” (Mark 14:36)

Here, in His darkest hour, sweating droplets of blood, Jesus was fully surrendered to the will of His Father in heaven. Yes, He cried out to God the Father to take the cup of wrath from Him, because everything is possible with God; but never did He ask anything apart from the sovereign will of His Father in heaven.

When He came into this world, Jesus said, “Here I am . . . I have come to do your will, O God” (Hebrews 10:7). And He never wavered in His glorious surrender. As Jesus knelt in Gethsemane, His soul “overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death” (Matthew 26:38), He didn’t pray “If it is possible for you,” but rather, “Everything is possible for you!” Our Lord is the perfect picture of the absolute strength of surrender.

So . . . is this the confession of your life? Do you want God wants for you, even when what He wants includes problems and pain? Remember, God only gives us what is necessary to continue conforming us into the image and likeness of His beloved Son (Romans 8:29; 2 Corinthians 3:18). And that process often includes difficulty, storms, and suffering.

Those trials are the refining fire that burns away our sinful self-absorption. Surrender is a battle, a fight; it is ongoing warfare against our self-centered nature’s desire to sit on the throne of our lives. We must remind ourselves every day that surrender is not an option! We all surrender to something. We will either surrender to Jesus or something smaller than Jesus.

Which will it be for you?

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

I want to share a passage of Scripture with you that, on the surface, can be frightening and even paralyzing to some:

Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. (1 Peter 5:8)

To be sure, we do have a malevolent enemy in the devil, and he prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. But he prowls only on the end of the Lord’s leash! Satan is subject to God and under His complete authority at all times. The devil does nothing apart from the sovereignty of God. Yes, the devil is the god of this world (2 Corinthians 4:4; 1 John 5:19), but God is the God of all worlds, and the adversary’s power to prowl is only the power that God gives him in order to fulfill the perfect purposes of God.

When the devil was afflicting Job, as difficult as that biblical narrative is to fully understand, he did only what God allowed . . . and no more! God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent; Satan is not. He is a creature like you and me—granted, an immensely powerful and formidable creature, but a dependent creature nonetheless. Knowing this infinite difference is the key to understanding the truth that the devil is a lion on a leash.

So . . . have you felt yourself under attack lately in your personal or professional life? God has the perfect prescription for dealing with this lion on a leash.

Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. (James 4:7)

When will the devil flee from your presence? Not just when you are resisting him, but when you have first submitted yourself to God. You see, Satan’s power must always be viewed in the context of God’s sovereignty, which should lead us to submission before our Savior each and every day.

God is not only with us, He is for us. In fact, God is so much for us that He turned against His only Son. You see, you and I were Christ’s Judas kiss. We were the nails in His wrists. We were His crown of thorns. We were His cross. We were His death. God sent His Son to die in our place that we might have eternal life in Him.

Yes, there is a lion on the prowl, seeking to devour everything in its path. But this lion will only do what God has ordained he can do and God always ordains what brings Him the most glory and His people the most good.

I understand that a lion on the leash is still a little frightening. Hey, a lion in a cage at the zoo is a little frightening! But we must always keep in view the nail-scarred hand that is holding that lion on a chain that will never break. Let this Gospel truth bring you great comfort today, regardless of where this finds you!

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

John Newton started out as a slave trader, commanding an English slave ship at the age of 25. When his ship nearly sank during a violent storm that battered his vessel, he looked toward heaven and cried out to Jesus.

Throughout his life wrote hundreds of hymns, the most famous, of course, being “Amazing Grace.” Written from personal experience, John Newton lived out the Gospel truth that forgiveness and redemption are always possible, regardless of the depths of one’s sin-filled life.

Physically blind at the age of 82, his memory and his health fading, Newton told a friend, “My memory is nearly gone. But I remember two things:

That I am a great sinner

and

Christ is a great Savior.”

On his tombstone are these words, “John Newton . . . once an infidel was, by the rich mercy of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, preserved, restored, pardoned, and appointed to preach the faith he had long labored to destroy.”

Wow! John Newton got it! He knew what he was and he knew what God in Christ had done for him. Make no mistake; there was no hyperbole in his claim to have lived a less-than-holy life. He knew he was a great sinner, by nature and by habit, and he understood that only a great Savior could redeem him from his wretched, wicked ways. Newton found that redemption in the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Bible makes it clear that we are all in the same desperate straits as John Newton. Folks, without Jesus, the ship is sinking! There is no exception: “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). There is no one who is righteous by virtue of his or her own good deeds, no not one of us (Romans 3:10). And because of these immutable truths, we need something outside of us to change what is going on inside of us. We need a Savior to take away our sin!

So . . . are John Newton’s two things to remember etched upon your heart? If you’re unsure, your answer can be found in understanding what your heart beats for. Does it beat for yourself or your Savior? Does it beat to expand the cause of your kingdom or the Kingdom of God? When we remember what great sinners we really are . . . AND how great a Savior Jesus Christ is, we have all the motivation we need to live for nothing smaller than Jesus.

Let me close out this meditation with those wonderful words from Newton’s great hymn:

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound

That saved a wretch like me.

I once was lost but now am found,

Was blind, but now I see.

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

I offer a word of great comfort and consolation to you today . . . and who reading this (or writing this, for that matter) doesn’t need a word of comfort and consolation? We live in a world that is increasingly marked by uncertainty and chaos, and it is enormously reassuring to know we have a God we can count on.

God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?

(Numbers 23:19)

In all of sacred Scripture it would be hard to find a more reassuring word to the people of God! God is not a man . . . and thank God for that! Man lies; God does not. Man changes his mind; God’s mind is immutable, unchangeable. Man speaks and does not act; when we read “This is what the Sovereign Lord says,” we can count on every word that follows. Man promises and does not fulfill; God promises and you can take every one of them to the bank!

We can all recall times when we made promises that we failed to keep; we all remember times when others made promises to us that they failed to keep. The problem is that we often view God in this same uncertain light . . . “Maybe He’ll do it and maybe He won’t.” And this is exactly what Satan wants us to think!

“Has God really said . . .?” the serpent slyly hissed to our first parents. Adam and Eve hesitated . . . and doubted . . . and the result of doubting God’s certain promise was catastrophic for Adam and for Eve and for all mankind.

Yet can you find a promise God had made that He has not fulfilled? You and I may waver in our promises, but when God makes a promise He keeps it! I’d like to exhort you to become what I like to call a “promise prospector”—one who searches the Scriptures for these nuggets of God’s gold. “There’s gold in them thar hills!” the prospectors from the 1800s cried. Let me assure you that there is gold of infinitely and eternally greater value contained in the promises of God! Here are just three such chunks of pure gold from a Bible that is chock full of them; may they bring you strength and hope, regardless of where this finds you today.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. (John 14:2-3)

[I am] confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. (Philippians 1:6)

If you enjoyed these promises, let me encourage you to open your Bible and read the 36^th chapter of Ezekiel. See how many promises you can find that God has made to His covenant people. And if you have placed your trust in Jesus Christ as your Savior, you are one of those people . . . and those promises are for you!

Being a promise prospector is one of the most powerful weapons we have in fighting against the flaming arrows of the evil one. You probably recall that in “the believer’s armor,” which is explained in detail in Ephesians 6:10-18, the only weapon for attacking the devil’s schemes is “the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God.” Let me encourage you to sharpen your sword every day!

The devil is a liar . . . and God is not. May that truth strengthen your heart today!

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

You might be familiar with the phrase, “Clothes make the man.” Many attribute the saying to Mark Twain, who, in addition to his writing, was known for his trademark white suits. But Mr. Twain was not the first to identify the natural human tendency to judge a book by its cover. During the Middle Ages, Erasmus, a Catholic priest and theologian said the very same thing—in Latin. Erasmus was quoting Quintilian, who in turn was quoting Homer’s Odyssey.

So . . . what is the most valuable outfit in your closet? Is it some new article of clothing? Perhaps something that has been handed down to you? Today I’d like to share a word of encouragement about the eternal truth that clothes really do make the Christian.

I delight greatly in the Lord; my soul rejoices in my God.  For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness . . . (Isaiah 61:10)

Clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the sinful nature. (Romans 13:14)

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. (Colossians 3:12)

The world tells us something quite different, doesn’t it? Armani, Chanel, Calvin Klein, Christian Dior, Louis Vuitton, Fendi, Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent, Valentino, Prada, and countless other brands shower us with messages that clothes define the man or woman.

But this is not for you! God’s Word tells us that our identity is in Christ alone. The clothes this world offers us are quite costly; they are available only to those who have enough money to buy them. The clothes that make the Christian are priceless . . . and yet they are available to anyone and everyone who trusts in Christ alone for salvation.

Then [the angel] showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right side to accuse him. The Lord said to Satan, “The Lord rebuke you, Satan! The Lord, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebuke you! Is not this man a burning stick snatched from the fire?”

Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes as he stood before the angel. The angel said to those who were standing before him, “Take off his filthy clothes.”

Then he said to Joshua, “See, I have taken away your sin, and I will put rich garments on you.” (Zechariah 3:1-4)

Satan hoped to hurl his fiery accusations at Joshua and disqualify him from serving as God’s high priest. But God rebuked Satan, because it was God who chose Joshua, in spite of his lack of qualifications. God removed Joshua’s filthy clothes and gave him rich garments, qualifying him to be His servant.

The same is true for you and me and every other child of God. Our sin clings to us just like filthy clothes. Do you remember the “Pig Pen” character from the Peanuts cartoons, who walked around with a cloud of dirt surrounding him? You and I are just like that! Scripture tells us that we are so far removed from the righteousness of God that even our righteous acts, by comparison, are filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6).

By nature, none of us is qualified to serve God—not even fit to come into His presence! But God comes to us in Christ, removes the foul, filthy, sinful rags of our sin and clothes us in the spotless righteousness of Christ. And now, clothed in this rich robe, we are invited to “approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Hebrews 4:16). Rejoice in that thought, Christian believer!

And now, wrapped in this incomparably rich garment, we are to go out and tell others of this glorious exchange that is freely offered to them. We are to be the fragrance and the aroma of Christ to a lost and dying world (2 Corinthians 2:14-15). We are, as Colossians 3:12 commands, to model the compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience of Christ to everyone we meet.

So, Christian, let me ask you: What would those around you say about the clothes you’ve been wearing lately? Do they make God attractive? Do they speak of His amazing grace? We must remember that for many people in this world, we will be the only Bible they ever read. May the clothes we wear encourage them to want to read more!

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

How many errands do you have on your “things-to-do” list today? Personally, I always seem to create a list that is far too long to complete! Experience has taught me that there is never enough time to complete everything that I want to get done, but there is always enough time to complete all that God wants me to get done. And one of the highest priorities on God’s to-do list for me and every one of His children is prayer—what I like to call “eternal errands.”

Look to the LORD and his strength; seek his face always.  (1 Chronicles 16:11)

The LORD is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth.(Psalm 145:18)

The LORD is far from the wicked but he hears the prayer of the righteous.(Proverbs 15:29)

Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.  (Luke 18:1)

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. (Philippians 4:6)

Pray without ceasing.  (1Thessalonians 5:17)

These are just a few examples of the eternal errands that God would have us run each and every day. The Bible makes it clear that one of the marks of the people of God is to be a posture of prayer. It’s truly unimaginable to think that the Creator of the universe invites us—commands us—to seek Him always through the throne of grace.

How many reasons can you find this day to go before your God in prayer? I’m sure that with even a little thought your list would become too long to count. And that is why we are to be in constant communion with Christ!

And know this: God does not care about the grammar of your prayers! God is not looking for flowing eloquence or grandiose rhetoric or theological exactitude. God does not demand some complicated metaphysical formula for approaching the throne of grace. Because He is “Abba” Father, He simply wants us to come to Him, whether we are praying in words, groanings, cries, or tears.

So . . . have you run any eternal errands today? Will you be running some later? Those people who say they don’t have time to pray really don’t have time not to pray! As a father of four, I love when my children come to me and make their requests. Why would I not? I am their father. So it is with our heavenly Father. He takes pleasure in—He delights in—the prayers of His children. Jesus invites us, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).

How about an “Eternal Errand” right now?

This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!